Oceane Michelon of France took the silver, 3.8 seconds behind, with her compatriot Lou Jeanmonnot securing bronze, but Kirkeeide's last lap will go down as one of the great Olympic biathlon redemption stories.
Left devastated after her underwhelming anchor lap caused her team to miss out on the podium in the mixed relay, Kirkeeide skied the final lap like a demon to close the gap on and pass Michelon, who was powerless to stop the Norwegian firebrand from snatching gold from her grasp.
With light snow falling and low cloud shrouding parts of the course, the competitors skied three laps with two visits to the shooting range, one prone and one standing, with each miss forcing a 150-metre trip around the penalty loop.
After winning the mixed relay and Julia Simon triumphing in the women's individual race, the French came into the race with high hopes, but few expected it would be Michelon, and not her more heralded teammates, who would take the silver in her first Olympic race.
Simon’s chances of adding to her two gold medals at the Games disappeared when she missed two shots on her second visit to the range, and Jeanmonnot was left to rue a single miss that cost her around half a minute as she slid down into the bronze medal position.
As the weather deteriorated, the leading contenders faltered, and none could deny Kirkeeide her dramatic victory.
"It feels absolutely brilliant," Kirkeeide said. "I had a good day on the course, and then I managed to hit all the targets, and then it was just a matter of going with everything I had on the last lap."
Michelon was not too downbeat.
"Incredible day. It was a long way to get there. I've been here for 10 days, and I was getting impatient," she said.
"I'm so happy I did such a good race - I believed I was maybe going to win my first race, but I kind of got some low blood sugar. I'm still super happy."